Affiliations

Jayne M. Thompson MA, MFA, GWS

Assistant Teaching Professor of English

I earned my undergraduate degree, summa cum laude, in literature from West Chester
University. I continued at WCU and earned my master's in English. Later I completed
my MFA in creative writing from Fairleigh Dickinson University. I teach as a volunteer
at S.C.I. Graterford. The men in my class and I published an anthology of their writings
with the help of Presidential Service Corps member, Emily DeFreitas '15, entitled Letters to My Younger Self: An Anthology of Writings by Incarcerated Men at S.C.I.
Graterford and a Writing Workbook, which was featured on National Public Radio's Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane.

The interview is archived on the Radio Times website, where listeners can hear the Graterford men read from their own work. I
am also the director of the Chester Community Writing Center, and I encourage all
to join me in spreading a love of reading to Widener, the entire Chester community,
and beyond. I believe that reading and writing create avenues to freedom.

MFA Creative Writing 2010

MA English 1995

West Chester University of Pennsylvania (PA)

CRWR 379
Writing Socially Engaged Fiction

CRWR 379
Historical Fiction

ENGL 115
Literature and Critical Writing—Literary Genres

My research interests include fiction writing and narrative theory. In addition, I
hear the cases of juvenile offenders in Chester, and I taught one class a day at Chester
High School for the school year. I am concerned about the school-to-prison pipeline,
juvenile sentencing practices, and mass incarceration.